The CT News Junkie Party
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Thu, 02/09/2006 - 10:29Last night I went to the CT News Junkie Party at Rajun Cajun in Hartford. I was a good party and as Dan Levine commented on CT News Junkie last night after the party, “It was fabulous to see so many people do more than just gripe about the state of journalism, but take action by eating some damn good food!”
If you want good journalism about what is going on in the State, be sure to check out www.ctnewsjunkie.com. If you want to eat good fried turkey, spicy chicken, crawfish and have some inexpensive beers in the Hartford area, be sure to check out Rajun Cajun.
Odi, et amo
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Wed, 02/08/2006 - 00:08"Can there be misery loftier than mine?" I don't want to be too melodramatic. I quote that line because it was a favorite from a play I was in in college. But today was a pretty miserable day. I took a lot of grief from a lot of people and I’m really tired of it.
A while ago, I heard a radio interview of a young woman who had volunteered at a halfway house as she pondered a career in social work. She found that she could not become a social worker because she couldn’t distance herself enough from her clients; she could not help but become emotionally involved.
When I was writing computer programs years ago, life was easier. The emotional involvement in a bond calculation subroutine is pretty low. But politics is different. I care about what happens, a lot. I've been told that I'm too thin skinned to be in politics, that if I can’t stand the heat, I should get out of the kitchen.
Well, I would like to get out of the kitchen.
Wearing lots of hats
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Mon, 02/06/2006 - 13:35Well, it looks like I’m putting on a new hat, working for the Ned Lamont campaign. It is going to be even more complicated keeping all these hats straight and hopefully this will help some of you have a better sense of the hats I’ll be wearing.
I expect to be spending a lot of time doing online organizing for the Lamont campaign. The details are still being worked out.
I will also continue to be involved with the DeStefano campaign. One of my biggest worries is that people will see this as some sort of coalition. I know there are Malloy supporters that support Lamont and that are DeStefano supporters that support Lieberman. I don't want my involvement in multiple campaigns to alienate such people. This will become all the more important when we all need to work together after the primaries.
The Super Bowl Beer Primary
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Mon, 02/06/2006 - 10:27(Cross posted at My Left Nutmeg)
Kim is doing scheduling for the Lamont campaign and I'm going to be very involved with the online part of the game, so we ended up having a weekend talking with people about Ned's campaign around the state.
In particular, I want to highlight a Super Bowl party we went to Saturday in Greenwich. I know a lot of people think of Greenwich and think of the palatial estates in the back country, but there is another side of Greenwich too. The party we went to was in a small apartment in downtown Greenwich.
The rebirth of Democratic Politics
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Sun, 02/05/2006 - 12:04Are we seeing a rebirth of Democratic politics in the United States? I think so, I believe so, and I will do all I can to help make this happen. I’ve been reading Robert Putnam’s, Bowling Alone : The Collapse and Revival of American Community. His portrayal of the collapse of American community, especially as it relates to the political process is disheartening.
Yet more recently, The Pew Internet & American Life report on The Strength of Internet Ties provides a more promising outlook. “The internet and email aid users in maintaining their social networks and provide pathways to help when people face big decisions”. One such big decision can be deciding to become involved in the American political process.
